Phillipsburg herald. [volume] (Phillipsburg, Kan.) 1882-1905, 1887-09-17
BOOE-HzE1gg BEEoRE TIE AaH OF /

BOOE-HAKHe BEFOHE rHE AGE or
FELN TING
OF course the Chinese were ahead Of
Europe. Their chronicles record print
ing upon silk or cotton IN the century
before Christ, paper being attributed
to the first century after Christ 1t is
certain that many hundred years ago
they had begun to put writing on trans-
fer-paper, lay the face downward on
wood or stone, rub OF the impression
or paste on the transparent paper, cut
away the wood or stone, and take an
impression IN ink which duplicated the
original. First. probably, they cut the
letters into the block, leaving black
letters on black ground. which method
DidOt thinks, was known to the Romans
and was the process referred to by
Pliny; sfterward they cut away the
block, leaving the letters raised, to
print black on white. This last process
Is attributed to FoOng-Taou, Chinese
Minister Of State in the tenth century,
who was driven to the invention by the
necessity Of getting exact copies Of his
official documents. Indeed, there is
detailed tradition Of a Chinese Guten-
berg, one Pitching, who in 1O41 carved
cubes Of porcelain paste with Chinese
characters, afterWard baking them,
and literally Setting" the porcelain
types, by help of parallel wires on a
plate Of iron In a bed of heated resinous
cement. These types he hammered or
planed even, and pressed close to-
gether, 50 that when the cement hard
ened they were practically a solid block,
which could be taken to pieces again
by melting the cement. But Pitching
was born ont of time, in the wrong
country, and to the wrong language.
The Chinese word-alphabet contains at
least $4,000, possibly 100000, char
acters (the National Printing Office at
Paris made types for $4,000, and for
the lesser number the Chinese COM
positor would require a large room to
himself, where he could wander among
500 eases looking for a sign, while
Chinese woOd-engravers viii cut on
pear-wood, or on the hard waxen COM
position used for that Oldest of exist
ing dailies, the Pelin Gazette, an octave
page of characters for 40 or so cents
Ia hundredth part Of the cost of coarse
work, a thousandth of the cost of the
finest work, here. The Chinese printer,
without a press, but with a double
brush like a canoe paddle, mixing the
block with one end, and pressing the
paper laid on the block with the dry
brush at the other end, prints 1000
sheets a day, on one side only, which
are then bound into a book by making
the fold at the front of the sheet, and
stitching through the cut edges at the
back. A fair-sized book is sold for 8
or 10 cents, and there is little in
ducement for improvement. Playing
cards, invented probably in HindOstan
as a modification of chess, and then en-
graved on ivory, were made in China
and in Hindostan centuries ago. and
thence they seem to have made their
way into Europe, probably through
| Saracens or Jews, before 400.
Meanwhile the business OF bOok-mal1-
ing by copying had had a curious de-
velopment in two directions. The in
dustry so furnishing in Cicero's Rome
had dwindled to nothing by the sixth
century. The great Libraries had been
destroyed. Few could write their
names; fewer could read The Irish
monks alone preserved the art of illumi-
Mating. and from the Island of Iona
shed such light as they could through
out Europe. Charlmagne himself could
not write, but used a curious monogram
to picture his Nance he was the more
ready, it may be, to permit his English
adviser, the monk Alcuin, to require
that every monastery should maintain
a scriptorium, and every convent OF
bishop should employ a permanent
copyist. ''using only Roman letters,
for the making of books.-HaIpeI's
1LdGdzi9le.